Subtitles

[Bobdisk]

Well, here is a statement, with a question following ! I use the subtitles very often. They are supposed to change colour when another person starts to speak. But on my Foxsat HDR they do not always do so, or they will change on the next written line, so for a deaf person it is confusing to know who is speaking. Has anyone come accross this problem? Has anyone an answer to this problem ?

 

[MikeSh]

Has anyone come accross this problem?

Never had a Foxsat, but this does happen occasionally on our Freeview and freesat boxes. I suspect it's the way the colour is triggered combined with whoever (or whatever) produces the subtitles sometimes making mistakes. I don't think there's a fix at the user level.

For maximum fun watch Netflix or Prime where the subtitles don't change colour ... Trying to read them while also seeing whose lips are moving is taxing. (I use the skip-back-a-bit functions a lot.)

 

[prpr]

It's entirely down to the broadcaster (i.e. whoever produces the sub-titles).

 

[Rodders53]

Foxsat-HDR can record and display two types of subtitle: Teletext and DVB subs. They may be subtly different in display and performance? Possibly. The (now retired) expert on BBC subs and technical kit for them is over on the DigitalSpy forum.

Live subtitling is more prone to errors than pre-recorded material as there's no time to review / check the subtitles sent. Even on iPlayer no-one will check/correct errors after the broadcast as far as I know.

Answer will be to report such errors to the broadcaster concerned.
With very specific info on channel, programme, broadcast date, start time and time(s) where, in the programme. the errors were seen. That may get fed back to the Producer/programme makers.

 

[Black Hole]

Live subtitling is more prone to errors...

Understatement of the year! They have BBC NEWS on in the pub with sound off and subtitles on. It's a guessing game what they actually mean!

 

[Bobdisk]

Trouble is, if I watch the same programme at the same time on other tvs, (Panasonic TH-37PXB, and Panasonic TX-32A400B) or dvr ( Panasonic DMR-EX88 and a newly aquired Humax HDR Fox T2), it always comes out accurately. Its only the FoxSat that does it, especially on network broadcasts, like series programmes. The new series of "Ten Pound Poms", "Inside No.9" and "Without Sin" all do it. I accept that live news broadcasts can be fun!!

 

[MartinLiddle]

Trouble is, if I watch the same programme at the same time on other tvs, (Panasonic TH-37PXB, and Panasonic TX-32A400B) or dvr ( Panasonic DMR-EX88 and a newly aquired Humax HDR Fox T2), it always comes out accurately. Its only the FoxSat that does it, especially on live broadcasts. I accept that news broadcasts can be fun!!

Could that be a difference between Freesat and Freeview handling of subtitles?

 

[Bobdisk]

Could that be a difference between Freesat and Freeview handling of subtitles?

I would not have thought they do things differently, if they did, effects would show up whatever the broadcast on both systems. I have another satellite receiver, not Freesat, and that is ok.

 

[Black Hole]

if I watch the same programme at the same time on other tvs, (Panasonic TH-37PXB, and Panasonic TX-32A400B) or dvr ( Panasonic DMR-EX88 and a newly aquired Humax HDR Fox T2), it always comes out accurately. Its only the FoxSat that does it

So what are you saying then: that the Foxsat has its own data stream for subtitles??

 

[Bobdisk]

I doubt that, it is that it is not handling the colour part of the subtitles information correctly. The words are always printed correctly, its that the colour does not change when somebody else begins to talk. I would think that its something to do with subtitle decoding, but I do not know how that works.

 

[EEPhil]

For maximum fun watch Netflix or Prime where the subtitles don't change colour ... Trying to read them while also seeing whose lips are moving is taxing. (I use the skip-back-a-bit functions a lot.)

For even better entertainment, try downloading a foreign programme without English subtitles. Then find there aren't any currently. Locate the original language subtitles that have probably been compiled using OCR. Run them through Google Translate. Then watch small white on white subtitles full of mistakes while trying to follow the plot of the programme. (Or wait 3 or 4 years for Walter to present it, with mistakes in the subtitles).

 

[Black Hole]

I would think that its something to do with subtitle decoding, but I do not know how that works.

Yes, OK, but my engineering experience informs me to look for a realistic and testable hypothesis. You say the Foxsat only sometimes doesn't switch subtitle colours on command when (simultaneously) other satellite receivers do. That it doesn't always fail makes it a subtle fault rather than an obvious one – whatever it is in the subtitle stream which switches colours is being received and acted on, at least part of the time.

One might envisage the subtitle system to be like serial text on an old-school VDU, and when VDUs went colour there were a range of command codes devised which could be embedded in the serial data to tell the VDU what colour to display the subsequent text (until the next command code). If a code were lost in transmission, the text would fail to change colour. That could point to an unreliable transmission link rather than a device fault. Alternatively, perhaps a colour code is being sent which is not in the Foxsat's repertoire.

However, using a character-and-command-code scheme for subtitles has limitations – in particular, every character which might be required for display, in every possible language, must be predefined in the display's memory (either at manufacture, by firmware update, or soft-defined in the data stream). As I understand it, Freeview uses a video overlay stream instead which sidesteps that limitation. My point is this: if satellite systems also use a video overlay, how can it possibly produce different coloured text on different receivers? Conclusion: it can't be using video overlay.

 

[MikeSh]

Given how bad the older Humax boxes are for keeping subtitles synced at times, a bug in the code wouldn't really surprise me.

Incidentally, while watching a recording on our new Arris Freesat box last night, while one person was talking the subtitle colour changed from white on the first line to green on the second - in mid sentence.

 

[MikeSh]

Walter to present it, with mistakes in the subtitles

Can't say I've seen many errors in WP stuff. Big advantage is that the subtitles are in the picture so don't get messed up if you pause to catch up.

Netflix foreign stuff can be annoying too. A lot of it is dubbed so you can pick spoken English and English subtitles. But one or both of two irritations often arises ... 1. The dubbing voice actors have really flat delivery so most emotion is lost. 2. The subtitles don't match the spoken words - the meaning is similar but the words used are different - which I find quite kind boggling.
So I tend to watch foreign content with the original language and English subtitles. (Some neat stuff from Poland recently.)

That does still have one infuriating catch in that sometimes a bit of English dialogue is used and in some programmes they don't bother subtitling it - presumably assuming that the only reason for someone wanting the subtitles is translation. Usually it doesn't matter but in one series there was a couple of minutes of significant plot being covered.

 

[Rodders53]

Trouble is, if I watch the same programme at the same time on other tvs, (Panasonic TH-37PXB, and Panasonic TX-32A400B) or dvr ( Panasonic DMR-EX88 and a newly aquired Humax HDR Fox T2), it always comes out accurately. Its only the FoxSat that does it, especially on network broadcasts, like series programmes. The new series of "Ten Pound Poms", "Inside No.9" and "Without Sin" all do it. I accept that live news broadcasts can be fun!!

I am assuming you are not watching freesat on the TVs, and rather using Freeview tuners i.e. not quite comparing the same thing? It's possible the satellite reception might be a data corruption thing; although odd if only the subtitles.

Check if you are using the Teletext subs or the DVB subs option? As I said earlier they may perform differently (though both are encoded from the same subs data in BBC emissions - even the Freeview ones use the same data from playout to the separate encoders).

I could possibly have a whiz through some of those programmes that I've recorded on my -HDR... I don't use subtitles normally. But I'd need to know which variant of BBC One and ITV you watch/record to be sure the two are identical (there is a small possibility of particular encoders corrupting stuff I guess).
I have Ten Pound Poms (BBC East) one episode, Without Sin (ITV Anglia West) four episodes. Inside never appealed to us first time out so we don't have any of those.

ITV satellite coding and distribution is different to it's terrestrial as the latter is done by the BBC C&M centres.

BTW have you installed the Custom Firmware on the Foxsat? If so, do run a disk diagnostics check in case there are some issues with the HDD in it that can be fixed?

NB (for @BlackHole especially, media info reports for my Foxsat's copy of Ten Pound Poms

Text #1
ID : 5503 (0x157F)-888
Menu ID : 10373 (0x2885)
Format : Teletext Subtitle
Language : English

Text #2
ID : 5504 (0x1580)
Menu ID : 10373 (0x2885)
Format : DVB Subtitle
Codec ID : 6
Duration : 59 min 32 s
Delay relative to video : 4 s 679 ms
Language : English

Freeview has only one text (from a Top Gear last June)

Text
ID : 6605 (0x19CD)
Menu ID : 17540 (0x4484)
Format : DVB Subtitle
Codec ID : 6
Duration : 1 h 0 min
Delay relative to video : 9 s 538 ms
Language : English

Finally https://www.edgeware.tv/dvb-subtitling/ has, I think, quite a good explanation of what DVB subs are and how they work.

 

[EEPhil]

Can't say I've seen many errors in WP stuff.

The subtitlers managed to get someone's name wrong in an Italian drama. A "merde" wasn't translated in a French series.

That does still have one infuriating catch in that sometimes a bit of English dialogue is used and in some programmes they don't bother subtitling it - presumably assuming that the only reason for someone wanting the subtitles is translation. Usually it doesn't matter but in one series there was a couple of minutes o

The same problem with the Italian series I tried to translate the separate subtitles for. There was a scene in German with Italian on-screen subtitles. Just about made sense of it.
(I'm not a fan of dubbed programmes either. Not only is the dialogue flat, they often only use two or three voice actors for all the parts - confusing!)

 

[MikeSh]

A "merde" wasn't translated in a French series.

I suspect that was intentional.

Not only is the dialogue flat,

Yes, I'm quite surprised at the amount of information contained in the 'sound' of language. Even though I understand no German, Polish or French (to speak of) having the correct intonation, etc, still makes a huge difference to the experience.

 

[EEPhil]

A "merde" wasn't translated in a French series.

I suspect that was intentional.

Not sure about that. Worse bad language made it through. Translation of swear words always seems a bit hit and miss. Even the same word gets translated differently in various parts of one programme.

 

[everthewatcher]

Translation of swear words always seems a bit hit and miss.

Not translation but I have a distant memory of a rude word being bleeped in sound but appearing in the subtitles.

 

[MikeSh]

Worse bad language made it through.

My theory on merde has two lines.
One is that it's a softer sounding word than our equivalent, thus less aggressive so to speak. Maybe more like our poo that the sh.. word. That makes it a more acceptable or appropriate word, in some contexts at least.
The other is that people in Britain watching these programmes are likely to know the word anyway, so translation isn't necessary and it also helps keep the flavour of (eg) Paris.